"Yes, you _would_! You _know_ what a liar she is. Even Eve said she
was a liar. Even Eve said she pretended to be sick so she could get
money out of her father! Why do you believe them? Oh!" cried
Martha, "he's a vile man! Vile! When I think of Richard having to
live with those people----" When her sobs let her speak, she went
on, "Mother, can't you see what a position he is in?"
"It doesn't seem a position that does any man any credit, Martha."
"All right!" cried Martha. "All right, let it go at that. I'll
never speak to you about him again, never." She never did.
It was well that there was a painted room in the house, those four
weeks before she went back to college. There was nothing else bright
about it. Bob waited to intercept letters from "that skunk" who, Mr.
Fairbanks said, was to be for some time in Rochester with his wife;
but no letters seemed to come. Martha appeared not to be humiliated
by the fact that she had practically declared her love for a man
hopelessly, permanently married. In her secluded room she bided her
time, a smile on her lips, the sweetest dream in her eyes. She was
ignoring her mother not only purposefully, but unconsciously. She
had greater things than a mother's anxiety to think about.
Her coldness sickened Emily every minute of the day. She scarcely
knew how to get through the hours, so burdened were they with
yearning over the silly girl. Never had the garden bloomed so
hilariously before in August and September. Never had it had such
care before. Emily watered her dahlias sometimes till midnight,
dreading a sleepless bed when she went into the house. She rose up
early and watered them under stars she had seldom seen setting. Once
out there, hoping, praying, she had looked up and in the very early
dawn seen Martha sitting dreaming at her window. And the sight of
that distant, alienated child took all the color from the dawn and
heaven.
Life indeed had assumed the color of dread and heart-sickness.
Johnnie had waited a few days, and then departed. Emily was glad she
had seized an occasion to say to him secretly, hurriedly, "Johnnie,
I'm very fond of you!" He had given her a surprised and precious
look. But he had not even said he was leaving. His mother said he
had gone down to have some coaching in philosophy--it was his last
year in college. Eve never came to the house. Emily met her
occasionally on the street, in the stores. And once she said,
passionately: "Oh, I hate to run into you this way! I'm ashamed to
look you in the face!" And in her own house the atmosphere was
either very cold, when she and Martha were together, or very sultry,
when Bob was with them, so that she lived in terror of some further
deadly burst of thunder.
Martha announced one day that she was going to Chicago for shopping.
She would naturally do that several times, getting her clothes ready
for the school year.
Emily said to her: "Before you go, Martha, you must promise me one
thing. You must promise me you will NOT see--at all--that man."
"You don't trust me any more?"
"No, Martha. It's your judgment. I don't trust your judgment."
"No, I suppose not. I see."
"Will you promise me that, Martha?"
"No, I don't think so. I don't think I will."
"What am I to do now?" thought Emily. "Shall I say that she can't
leave this house till she promises me that?"
Martha was looking at her hostilely, steadily. "I'll tell you what
I'll do. I'll think it over. I'll tell you to-morrow what I'll do,"
she said.
On the morrow, she said, "Mother, if it will do you any good, I'll
promise--what you want me to."
"Oh, Martha!" Emily cried to her, "you _must_ promise me that,
absolutely! Martha, I just couldn't let you go away to school again,
unless you promise me that!"
"All right, I promise you. If you can't trust my--judgment, as you
say"--she spoke sarcastically--"I suppose you can--believe--what I
say."
Bob's eyes dwelt resentfully upon his daughter, and loyally on his
distressed wife, all those painful last days before Martha left for
the East.
"I'll bet you lost twenty pounds this summer, Emily!" he said,
ruefully, when they were alone at length.
"Well, thank goodness for that!" she retorted, loyal to the child.
"I wish I'd lost twenty more." She knew he would count grudgingly
all the ounces she suffered. Yet it was no great thing to him if
Martha had lost her very heart.
_Chapter Six_
They gathered their green tomatoes, to save them from the frost.
Emily and Maggie, in the delicious kitchen, made chilli sauces and
the good kind of vegetarian mincemeat. The house was filled with the
excellent odors of the ends of the earth. Java and Jamaica were
stirred into Illinois, and sealed away in sturdy bottles which took
their places chronologically in the cupboard next to the wild grape
and the crab-apple jelly below the spiced peaches. The bottles had
to be pushed close against one another, now, to make room for them in
the crowded shelves.
But when Emily looked into the cupboard of her heart, it was bare.
She had dug the gladiolas; she had cut the last of the lavender
statice, which she had sown in happier days to make glamour in the
painted room, and hung it head downward to dry with the rosy
strawflowers. The frosts came and turned the hard maples gaudy. The
old Fiske place seemed always to lose its head completely in the
fall. There grew a barberry hedge along the front walk, which
Emily's father had planted when he took down the white picket fence.
He had simply put those little dry-looking shoots into the ground one
rainy spring morning years ago, never imagining what riot he was
planting. For years now, on every brilliant Sunday afternoon, while
the leaves were falling, townspeople had walked out to see that
hedge, to hear its rejoicings. The knowing had taken cuttings of it,
to their disappointment, for even that offspring hedge just across
the road had never been able to achieve quite such giddiness. Some
people said it was the soil that did it. Others maintained it was
the way in which the water soaked down to the river just there. Such
cherries of ripeness, such roses and purple grapes and bleeding
pomegranates of hues, such plums and persimmons and exotic luminous
loquats glowing together, such oranges and oracles of color, no other
hedge could summon. People got joy out of it according to their
moods and natures. But Emily, for once, could take no pleasure in it.
"Last year," she would say to herself, resentfully, "I enjoyed just
sitting at this window mending socks. Anything made me happy last
year." But now, when she sat down with her sewing, she wasn't seeing
what was before her--the hedge, or anything else. The fingers of one
hand would be intertwined tensely with the fingers of the other, and
she would be sitting as it were, screwed up tight against herself,
seeing that face bending down over Martha, that hateful, alienating
face. She was seeing Martha in a gingham frock standing at that
table, saying in a voice like the angel of some heavenly
annunciation, "Richard Quin is getting a divorce." "I'm a fool!" she
would say angrily to herself over and over, resolving not to worry.
When one day some child with bitter-sweet had reminded her of a
promise to Martha made early in June, she had got Bob to drive her
out to where the vine grew heavily on a barbed wire fence. She and
Martha had been chattering just there in July, as they drove along,
and Martha had made her promise to gather some of it for the painted
room. And that afternoon, after she had arranged it in the red
copper bowls, she had lain down on a day bed and just cried and cried
like a silly girl, so that, in spite of her precautions, Bob had eyed
her at supper and laid another charge against Martha in his memory.
Martha would not come home for Thanksgiving. Emily had never
suggested it to her before. They had agreed that it wasn't worth
while coming so far for so few days. But this year Emily had hoped
that some way, if she came, they might come to some understanding.
But Martha refused to come. Her letters arrived as regularly as
ever, as if she had determined that in this disagreement she was to
be found in the wrong not at all. She was going to do her duty to
her mother, however unsatisfactory that mother might be. She wrote
regularly, therefore, such noncommittal and indifferent letters as
she might have written to her father had necessity arisen. And Emily
counted the weeks wearily till she would have the child with her
again. Surely the separation, if nothing else, would bring her to
her senses; and she tried not to worry. Martha had given her her
word of honor that she would not see the man again. She had always
been a truthful child; there was no gainsaying that.
Then one day, shortly before the Christmas holiday, Emily got a most
disturbing letter from Eve. She wrote loyally in a very storm of
perplexity. She had promised Martha faithfully that she would not
write this to her mother, she began. And the more she thought about
it, the more certain she was that she must write it. Martha scarcely
spoke to her--she never did if she could manage not to without being
noticed. Martha had said two days ago to her that she was not going
home for Christmas. And everybody was saying how bad Martha looked.
She was sick; she had no color; and all the girls said she was
changed. And Eve had to cry about it, because she believed it was
that horrid affair of last summer. Martha had never been the same
since. And if she wasn't going home for Christmas, certainly some
one ought to tell her mother how bad she looked. Eve begged Emily
never to tell Martha she had written--to deny it up and down, if
Martha guessed. But she was just sick about Martha. "After all, I'm
older than she is, and I have more sense," Eve wrote. "And I can't
help feeling that it's our fault. I would wish with all my heart we
had never gone to Illinois--only then I wouldn't have known you."
And the next day Martha's letter had come, announcing her intention
of spending the vacation in New York. Just New York, if you please,
no address given, no intimation of her company. "You know what will
happen if I come home," she wrote. "I'll just quarrel with father
and you'll be miserable. It's better for me to stay away."
Martha had left this announcement, naturally, to the very last
minute. But Eve's letter had prepared Emily. She telegraphed at
once, knowing she had likely just time to reach Martha before she
left college, that she was to meet her in a certain hotel in New York
the next afternoon. She said nothing to Bob about Eve's letter.
Eve's anxiety and Martha's impertinence between them had upset her
completely. Did Martha imagine she was going to be allowed to
announce her departure for unknown places and companies in this
high-handed manner? What was the child thinking of? Was it
possible--that she might not get the telegram? Was it possible that
if she did, she wouldn't obey?
Emily had chosen that hotel hastily. She usually stayed with cousins
in New York. But at Christmas time they might be having a house
full. Besides, she couldn't endure the thought that Martha might be
indifferent to her before them.
So she moved about the room she had taken in the hotel. She arranged
the things she had unpacked, and rearranged them. She looked at the
time, and she looked out of the window to the crowded street very far
below. Martha was already a little bit late. Suppose she never came
at all! Suppose she hadn't come by dinner time, by bed time! Emily
couldn't sit still.
And then she heard some one; she opened the door; Martha was there,
in her racoon coat, in a rosy little hat of many colors, pulled down
over a sallow face; Martha was in her arms, and crying; in a second
Martha, coat and all, was lying on the bed, her face in her mother's
lap, repenting with bitter tears.
"Oh, I've been so horrid to you, mammie! I've been so horrid to you!
I'm so sorry!" She was hugging her, clinging to her, imploring her
pardon.
So Emily cried, too, for surprise and relief, and comforted her, and
urged her to stop crying. This was better than anything she had
dared to hope for. But she had known all the time Martha would come
to herself. The child hadn't meant anything, really. She had always
been such a good girl. Emily in a second could have forgotten every
minute that had not been satisfactory. This was well worth having
come to New York for.
Martha wasn't succeeding in regaining her composure. Emily attempted
to take her coat off, but thought it better not to bother her. She
just lay and cried. And she had never been a crying child. Emily
had seen to that. All these tears, all this passion of repentance,
showed what a loving little heart she had. "How I have wronged the
child!" Emily mused, wiping her eyes. "I thought she might not come
at all!" And she caressed her, and waited patiently. "Don't cry any
more now, Martha," she said. "We'll forget all about it."
"Oh, I wish I'd been a good girl!" And having said that, she wept on.
She cried too long.
Emily said, presently: "Your feet are making a mark on the bedspread.
Get up. Take off your coat."
"I'm cold, mammie." She sat up, fumbled about, and kicked off her
low shoes, and lay down again, trying to cuddle her feet up under her
coat.
"Cold?" The room had been so hot a moment ago that Emily had the
windows both opened. She got up and went and shut them.
"Where's your baggage?" she asked in a matter-of-fact way, to stop
the tears.
"I had it taken to my room."
"Your room?"
"I took a room for myself. I didn't know you would have two beds in
here."
Emily was on the point of saying, "You might at least have inquired."
But Martha went on:
"I'm so tired, mammie, I just had to have a room for myself. I could
sleep a week straight off."
"Well," said Emily, doubtfully. She turned on the light. Martha
hadn't even taken her little hat off. It was crushed down over an
ear. Her nose was red. She looked like a wreck. She didn't like
her mother's scrutiny.
"Turn off that light," she pleaded.
Emily turned it off.
"Get up and wash your face," she said.
But Martha cried, "Oh, mammie, honestly, I never meant--to hurt you!"
and threw herself down, sobbing, her face buried in her hands.
Emily remembered Eve's letter, and grew more pitiful. "I never would
have thought this would prey on her mind so much," she thought. "How
am I going to make Bob understand this? I wish he could hear her
now." It was very bad for her to cry so deeply, however.
"Where is your room, Martha? I want to see it. Brace up."
"I'll show it to you--after a while." She still was sobbing aloud.
She seemed hysterical.
"Martha," said Emily, with some sternness, "stop that; stop crying.
Get up. You must get ready for dinner."
Martha sat up, huddled together on the edge of the bed. She spoke
very humbly.
"I don't want any supper, mammie. Honestly, I don't feel like
eating. I'm tired. I want to go to my room. I'd rather go to bed."
Emily stood looking at her wiping her eyes. Poor Lamb! Poor
tender-hearted child! She did look wretched. Perhaps she ought to
be humored--just for this once.
"All right. We'll have our supper up here. We'll have a regular
spread."
"Honestly, I don't want anything to eat."
"Well, you've got to eat something. That's all there is to it."
"All right, mammie."
They went together to look at Martha's room, two floors above
Emily's. Martha was repressing sobs, now, like a threatened child.
Emily asked about the college, to compose her. Had she done good
work this term? But she said meekly she didn't think she had done
very well, not lately, anyway, when she had been so sort of tired.
Emily was eager to question her, but thought it better to wait. She
offered to help unpack the suitcase, but Martha was jealous of it, as
if it was filled with Christmas presents.
Emily went back to her room, to wait for the supper she had ordered.
She sang to herself. "O come, all ye faithful," she hummed, "joyful
and triumphant." She was infinitely relieved and lifted up. She had
an impulse to telegraph Bob that everything was right again. No, but
as soon as supper was over, she would write him a long letter. She
would explain the child's repentance, her sweet, humble coming back.
She was so happy that, when Martha came in, she just naturally took
her in her arms and kissed her.
Martha had come in steady and composed, but wearing the coat of a
suit. Emily said, naturally, "Why have you got that on?" Her remark
upset Martha entirely. She sobbed again. Emily reproved herself and
scolded Martha lightly. Here was their supper. What a lot of
dishes! Oh, what a good time they would have, cozily here, together.
She called Martha's attention to the pink lamp-shade. "Not bad," she
said, "for a hotel room."
But Martha sat like a punished child, not whimpering aloud, but
shaking from time to time with stifled sobs. When Emily had
insisted, she had ordered coffee and an alligator-pear salad, and it
seemed to Emily that the salad was mentioned hurriedly, as an
afterthought, to propitiate a mother. When the salad was set before
her, she wasn't eating it. She said apologetically that the oil
wasn't quite fresh. Emily had offered her some chicken, and insisted
on her taking some. And so she did, and swallowed it obediently.
And she asked for more coffee. No wonder she was thin, if this was
the way she had been eating. Emily was about to refuse her more
coffee. But, surely, to-morrow, after a night's sleep, she would be
herself again.
"I'm going to stay in bed till noon to-morrow, mammie," she said.
"Aren't we going home to-morrow?"
"Oh no, not to-morrow! Let's wait--a little while--till I--feel
rested," she begged. So that was agreed. And there seemed nothing
else to say. For Martha sat looking at her mother wistfully, wiping
away tears that kept flowing. And Emily refrained from talking
because she seemed to be making matters worse. They were perfectly
silent while their supper was being carried away. And when the door
shut behind the waiter, Martha said--she had been standing looking
down out of the window, and she turned about towards Emily:
"Are the bulbs in the window, mammie?"
"What bulbs? At home?"
"Yes. The Poet's narcissi in the hall window."
"Yes. They're almost out--the first ones. I've got a surprise for
you, Martie!"
"What?"
"I've got three purple hyacinths almost ready to bloom, for your
room--in glasses, you know!"
Now did not that seem an innocent remark? Yet Martha began simply to
boo-hoo.
"I'm going to bed," she sobbed.
"I think you'd better." Emily wouldn't be sarcastic, but she spoke
dryly. She insisted on going up and helping her get to bed. She
kissed her shortly, for fear of more bewailings, and promised not to
waken her in the morning.
"I'm nervous, because I can't sleep always," Martha apologized. "I'd
rather sleep than do anything else. I'll never forgive you if you
wake me up in the morning. I'll get up and come down to you just as
soon as I wake up. Nobody ever had a better mother than I've got!"
"Oh, cut out the sobby stuff, Martie!" Emily exhorted her. "Don't be
crying yourself to sleep. Have you got anything to read, if you
don't think you'll sleep?"
"Oh yes. I don't need anything. Nothing."
After twelve the next day Emily returned from a morning's shopping.
The Christmas crowds had thrust her about. They had pushed her and
jostled her and jammed her into corners. But she was in a mood for
it all. She could take it light-heartedly. They couldn't take the
song from her. "O come, all ye faithful!" she kept humming to
herself. Wasn't she prepared for Christmas? Wasn't she eager to
kneel and worship the Eternal Child! It was almost as if Martha had
been born to her again. She tipped the elevator boy exuberantly just
because she was so happy, as she went up to her room.
Martha wasn't there. She couldn't be sleeping, surely, at that hour.
She would go up to her room. She stood close to Martha's door. She
called her softly; she called her not quite so softly, but carefully.
Martha was awake inside. Martha was coming to the door.
Martha had on her fur coat, and her rosy hat, ready to go out. She
drew her mother in. They kissed. "She's been crying again!" Emily
thought. "She looks ghastly! She must have cried all night." Her
eyes were dry, but ringed about with sunken circles. She spoke
quietly. She seemed to be speaking from a great depth of--what?--not
worry--a depth of hopelessness, Emily thought, quickly.
"You been shopping, mammie? Weren't the crowds terrible?"
"Yes, terrible! But I did want to get a few things before we go
home. Are you feeling better? Shall we go to-morrow? if we can get
reservations?"
Martha sat thinking.
"Yes. I think we'd better go to-morrow, if you can get them."
"You're ready to go for lunch?"
"Yes; if you---- Yes, I'm ready."
"Have you had breakfast?"
"I had enough."
"What did you have, Martha?"
"I--didn't feel like much. I had coffee and toast."
But when they sat in the darkest corner of a crowded, noisy
restaurant, she only pretended to be eating. She scarcely spoke, and
when she did her voice was--strange, so that Emily sat thoughtfully
watching her.
"Can you go and get the reservations after we've finished?"
"Yes, I can. Aren't you coming with me?"
"I want to go out for just a thing or two, mammie. But look here,
can't you just--pay part of the tickets? You don't have to pay it
all to-day, do you?"
"Why? Why not?"
"I mean--if I don't feel well enough to go to-morrow."
"This is no place to begin to catechise her," Emily thought, "but
I've got to find out what's the trouble with her, some way, before
long."
"I don't know whether they will reserve them that way or not. I'll
ask, if you want me to."
"I think it would be--a good plan."
Martha was sitting with her back to the room, her elbow on the table,
and her head on her hand--not in a correct way, nor a graceful way.
Emily looked at her. After all, look how other people
sat--well-dressed people, but not nice-looking people.
Horrid-looking girls, some of these were. Who, she wondered, were
they? If Martha preferred not to talk, there was much for a
small-town woman to be looking about at, in the room: smart clothes,
painted faces. It was absolutely a thrill to see a woman so
shamelessly vicious-looking, with some sort of green paint to make
shadows under her eyes. Emily's unsophisticated glance was intent
upon the person. The waiter was putting her parfait before her, when
a bomb, thrown from Martha's colorless lips, made her almost jump.
"Tell father--- I mean--he doesn't know how much I appreciate him,
mammie. He's been a good father to me, always."
Goodness gracious me! What in the world? The child must be out of
her mind!
"Martha!" said Emily, sharply, "what is the matter with you?"
"I'm sorry I've always been so--horrid to him."
"Now look here, Martha, let that drop! You mustn't be morbid about
this. I'll explain everything to him for you, if you want me to."
"Yes, do, mammie."
"I'll take that child to a doctor to-morrow!" Emily resolved.
They parted abruptly when they rose from the table. Martha went out
to get her few things. Emily went to the station for her
reservations, curiously. And she dallied about. They were to have
tea together at four-thirty. It was Emily's suggestion. Anything to
get Martha to eat, she had thought.
She came back to the hotel carrying a large box of the most tempting
chocolates she could find, and candied fruits, which Martha had been
eager for. She didn't like the hotel she had chosen. The lobby, the
whole floor, was full of groups of men, business men, perhaps,
standing around importantly pretending to be discussing affairs of
moment, and covertly eying every woman who entered. Well, thank
goodness, she was no longer either young or conspicuous. But how
they must look at Martha! She went to the desk and asked for her key.
Now the sleek-haired young man standing there, instead of handing it
to her promptly, went and spoke to a more important young man
somewhat older. This man heard what he said and looked curiously at
Emily, while the second one approached her.
"Are you Mrs. Kenworthy?" he asked, suavely.
She said she was.
"Will you step this way, please?"
She hadn't time to ask why. He had come out from behind the
counter-like desk and was showing her the way--a few steps down a
passage.
"Just here," he was saying. "The manager wants to speak to you."
And he threw open a door into a lighted office, and said, "This is
Mrs. Kenworthy," and went out, and closed the door behind him.
Emily, wondering mildly, saw in a glance a sort of office; a room in
which, perhaps temporarily, a good deal of extra furniture was
crowded--several easy chairs pushed close together, beyond a long
bare oak table, with shaded desk lamps. Three men were standing
there, by the table, the shadow of the lamp-shade hiding their faces.
"Are you Mrs. Kenworthy?" one of them asked her.
"Yes," she said. She didn't like this.
"Has your daughter a dog?"
The man didn't seem facetious.
"Pardon me!" Emily spoke coldly.
The man was looking at her keenly.
"I said, has your daughter here a dog?" He made a gesture and----
Why, there was Martha, sunken down in the farther one of those
crowded armchairs--that was her coat and hat, at least; her face was
hidden. Emily moved quickly towards her.
"What do you mean?"
"Madame, this young lady has been trying to buy poison for her dog."
"There is some mistake about this." Emily felt herself begin to
tremble. "My daughter hasn't a dog."
"We didn't think she had."
"What happened, Martha?" Emily's hand was on her shoulder, but
Martha never lifted her head.
"What--do you mean?" Emily faltered. They looked so ominous--so
excited. Nobody spoke.
"Oh, will you tell me what you mean?" Emily cried out. Something
frightful was here.
"Madame, we have to protect ourselves. We can't have some
one--taking her own life--in our rooms every month in the year. This
girl--we kept her here--we didn't think she had a dog. She was
trying to buy poison, madame!"
"You're mistaken! Martha, what were you doing?" She tried to get
her to speak.
"Madame, we have had to offer a reward--to any employee who
prevents--such a thing. This bell-boy"--he was actually indicating a
negro standing near him--"just happened to be in a drug store, and
saw your daughter refused--this poison. He recognized her; he
followed her into another drug store. Who'd sell a girl with that
face--anything? He called this policeman."
"I think you're all mistaken. She hasn't been well. I'll take her
up and put her to bed," Emily babbled. She was kneeling on the floor
by Martha, shaking Martha's arm, and urging her to explain.
"No, madame, not to the ninth floor, not a girl in that condition.
We have to defend ourselves. We'll let you talk to her here." He
started towards the door. "Just ring here, I'll come back for you."
"Martha! Baby! What is this? What were you doing? What happened
after I left you? Tell me! Tell me, Martha! Why didn't you explain
to those men?"
When Emily tried to pull her hands away from her face, Martha stirred
and jerked back, and buried it in her coat sleeve. Her little thin
voice came out, muffled, gasping:
"I've got to die."
Could it be that the child still loved that man so? What else could
it be?
"You mustn't say such things, Martie! Martha, why didn't you say to
them you weren't trying to buy--anything. Were you?"
"Yes, yes. I've got to die."
Emily's hand was stroking her arms tenderly.